Maria Friedman as Mother and Dave Willetts as Father in the prologue from Ragtime, playing at the Piccadilly Theatre in London.

Ragtime is a tapestry of New York area life in the first decades of the 20th century. People from radically different walks of life -- an African-American family, a Jewish immigrant family and a wealthy suburban WASP family -- see their lives intersect in the aftermath of a crime, with unexpectedly emotional results. The original Broadway production played at the Ford Center for the Performing Arts 1998-2000.